Hobart has been one of my favorite literary zines for a long time — and I have a new story in it this month, called “Quiet.” It starts like this:
He suggested we go to the rooftop where it was quiet, and I said yes, though I knew he didn’t really want to talk with me. I knew what he wanted. That hadn’t changed. Then and now he wanted go to a place we could fuck, though he never said the words, let’s go fuck, much less, I want to fuck you. He was obvious but never forthright, which is why I couldn’t blame him afterwards, for misleading me, or for disappearing.
This is my second story in ZYZZYVA — and my second ZYZZYVA story inspired by Craigslist. It’s titled “People Say they Want Something.” Here’s an excerpt:
It was because of a couch that I met Cellie. The couch was ugly and listed under free stuff. I figured I could use it until I found one I actually wanted. The photo showed a cheap, boxy thing that looked to be made of Styrofoam. “It’s got some stains on it. It can be cleaned, but I haven’t gotten around to it,” read the description. This seemed very honest. I texted the number on the ad.
She called me back immediately. “Can you get it tonight?” she said.
“Tonight?”
“I really need to get it out of the house tonight.”
“Oh, is a new one being delivered tomorrow?”
“No, I just want it gone.”
I demurred. “Tonight is difficult….”
At that she went at me: “See, this is the problem. People say they want something, but then they just flake on you. I don’t get it. Why do you go through the trouble of reading Craigslist and contacting people when you have no intention of actually getting the stuff? I really want to know. Why?”
“No, I really want the couch,” I said
“Why?”
“Why do I want the couch?”
“Yeah, why,” she said, then laughed hysterically. The laughter went on for a while, long enough that she started making me laugh, incredulously, and a little curiously too. I wondered if it would ever stop. Then she was back. “Seriously, why do you want it? It’s disgusting.”
Get a copy of ZYZZYVA no. 119, Winter 2020! And join me for the launch reading, happening on Zoom on Thursday, Nov. 12, 2020 at 6 pm PT. Hosted by City Lights Books, the reading lineup is Wendy C. Ortiz, Jonathan Escoffery, Andrés Reconco, Kathleen Mackay, Nina Revoyr — and me, Siel.
All the upheavals of 2020 perhaps make now the perfect time to read Yun Ko-eun’s latest novel, The Disaster Tourist. This slim work centers around Jungle, a Korean travel company that caters to people’s love of gawking at accidents. Jungle coldly quantifies natural catastrophes and human suffering into tourist dollars, designing tour packages that tug at people’s heart and purse strings.
The poets arrived in style, wearing trench coats and velvet gloves, combat boots and platform Mary Janes. They slunk around looking dark and dangerous — though the day was preternaturally bright, a perfect July Saturday in Los Angeles.
The event: The sixth annual Poetry Circus. The brainchild of local poet Nicelle Davis, this annual extravaganza is described as a community event that “blurs the line between performer and audience to allow everyone the chance to run away and join the circus.” In more practical terms, The Poetry Circus combines zippy poetry readings with circusy joie de vivre at the merry-go-round in Griffith Park. When I arrived around six, the crowd was lazily milling about, getting their faces painted and leafing through chapbooks of poetry at the tables literary presses and organizations that had set up around the area.
The theme for 2019 was Circus Noir, which is why fashions ranged from film noir to circus punk. I was one of the poets invited to read, but if there was a memo about coming in costume, I missed it — and showed up in a sundress.
Luckily no bouncers enforced a dress code, though there were a couple men in three-piece suits and fedoras who swashbuckled around like they might soon enforce — something.
We soon found out what that something was: poe-hibition! No poetry allowed! Nicelle announced in a faux-tremulous voice that readings could continue — so long as the words didn’t make anyone feel anything.
And so with cheeky aplomb, round one of the circus acts began. “I think you better get ready! I’m about to go to jail doing this,” Douglas Manuel declared before launching energetically into his first poem.
The performances were as moody as the costumes. “Red is so needy, so eager to spill on the floor,” read Armine Iknadossian in a slow, sensual drawl. She wore long velvet gloves. She applauded the other poets by tinking a long cigarette holder against a martini glass. Jennifer Bradpiece also had her accessories: lace fingerless gloves, striped stockings, and a tiny hat with feathers pinned to hear head. Sample line: “You slip a peach pill between pink lips.”
Between readings, the fedora men kept up the poe-hibition ruse. “There’s no way these are poets,” one declared about half way through. “They’ve been incredibly timely!” It was true. Each of the twelve poets in the round had been given just four minutes to read, and for once everyone stuck to the limit — likely because Nicelle had sent out a simple yet effective warning a few days before: “YOU WILL BE KICKED OFF STAGE BY THE NOIR TEAM, if you go over your time.”
As the first act ended, I thought: Maybe all poetry readings should be limited to four minutes. They’re so much more enjoyable that way…. I was about to go looking for the snack table when Nicelle declared: free merry go round rides!
Then there was a puppet show from the Bob Barker Marionettes.
The first Poetry Circus happened six years ago. Since then, the annual event has brought hundreds to the park. This year’s event, of course, was the noirest.
The sun set. Things got ravier as Nicelle and other organizers handed out glow lights and neon party hats and snake bracelets. The second round of poets went up, then the third — my group.
Awards for most noir-circus outfits go to Ivey Merrill who came in a black goth-ish cheerleader type skirt and black platform Mary Janes (sample line: “Temporarily, razors can help”) and Melanie Jeffery with her purple hair and Doc Martens (sample line: “Cinderella’s doing time for prostitution”).
Here’s one of the poems I read:
Then suddenly, it was over. The fedora men gave their final poe-hibition threats. Nicelle thanked the audience for coming and asked us to help clean up by folding up our chairs and taking them to a designated corner. I did that, then I found the snack table and ate cookies.
Then we all walked across a grassy hill to the parking lot and drove into the starless night.
The Poetry Circus will return in 2020, though the exact date hasn’t yet been set; keep it on your radar by following the Poetry Circus Facebook page, and support it by making a donation through GoFundMe.
All photos by Andrea V, except for the selfie taken by Liz Rizzo on the merry go round
Spring is over — but the Spring 2019 issue of The Hopkins Review has just come out, and it has a story of mine in it!
“Dumbo” is about a floor of smart girls in college who all happen to have hooked up with the same guy. Here’s a short excerpt:
We lived on the girls-only floor for the science scholars. The opportunity to live there was sold to us and our parents as a privilege and a perk, a reward for our high AP Biology scores and violin playing and community service projects, and as good girls we checked yes, we would welcome this social privilege, come to us at long last after the lonely years of high school. It was only after we arrived that we found out a floor of female scientists was not valued highly in this keg-stands and undie-runs college. We were, on the whole, not lookers. Glasses wore coke-bottle lenses. Skinny tied her hair in ponytails that gave her scrubbed face a tight, pulled-back look. Amoeba’s soft, doughy limbs resembled pseudopods, slowly extending and contracting around cheap, cakey treats. Lisse was the exception, with her dark-red hair and big boobs. She wore makeup and tight T-shirts. She curled her eyelashes. On Sunday nights she slathered her face with an algae-green mask before going to bed. “My mom swears by it, for soft skin,” she said when we asked about it in the morning, the mask now hard and cracked like a putrid eggshell. Later, alone in our rooms, we wondered why our mothers hadn’t instructed us in any of these feminine wiles.
This story is part of a longer collection I’m working on called Defects, which you know about if you subscribe to my love notes…. Hope you enjoy the read —
Organized by Nicelle Davis whom I’ve been reading with a lotlately, The Poetry Circus is an interactive art event series described as “part workshop, community outreach, performance, ride, dance, and creation.” There’ll be poets, the Bob Baker Marionette Theater, face painting, light refreshments, and circus acts! Here’s the schedule:
When: Sat., July 13, 2019, 5 pm-10 pm Where: The Griffith Park Merry-go-round Cost: Free, but if you’re into it, The Poetry Circus has a gofundme campaign going on.
I’ll be reading in round 3, at 8:20 pm, though I’ve been already warned by previous attendees that the schedule usually gets behind due to the tendency of poets to go on way past their time limit (Poets — quit doing that, seriously!).
